My argument with the whacko FAU professor

Remember James Tracy, the FAU professor who claimed that the Sandy Hook shootings and the Boston Marathon bombings were government plots?
I left a message on his blog on a post where he complained that he was a victim of a smear campaign from the South Florida Sun Sentinel.
Now granted, I have not spent all the time he has pouring over video and photos from Sandy Hook and Boston, looking for telltale signs of fakery, but then again, I guess that's because I think doing such an investigation without good reason is a smear and people who lost their legs in a terrorist attack don't deserve to be accused of faking and people who lost their kids in a shooting don't deserve to be accused of faking their grief and God help anyone who says "Prove to me he really did lose his legs" or "Prove to me his kid really did die."
Anyway, the exchange went like this:

[Smallpotatoes] says:

June 22, 2013 at 1:08 pm

Cry me a river. You want to know who the real victims of smear campaigns were? They were Robbie Parker, Gene Rosen and Jeff Bauman.

Reply

James says:
June 22, 2013 at 2:53 pm

This observation suggests that a handful of bloggers are capable of “smearing” figures presented and vigorously defended by mainstream outlets and government officials. It ranks up there with the Swiss army having the potential for world conquest, or Al Qaeda actually posing a serious threat to Western national security. Asserting such fallacies is not necessarily helpful or effective in this forum, but it might earn one a position on the Sun-Sentinel’s editorial board.

Reply

[Smallpotatoes] says:

June 22, 2013 at 7:46 pm

James, you’re implying that innocent people who in the case of Bauman were severely injured and in the case of Parker suffered the worst thing a parent can ever suffer were not victims but actually a part of some conspiracy. They’re good people who did not ask to be put in the situations they were in. They do not deserve the kind of scrutiny people like you are giving them.
And don’t ever take that smug tone with me again.

Reply

James says:

June 23, 2013 at 1:21 am

Given the rather provocative stance [Smallpotatoes] is taking, and the interlocution he is inviting James Tracy in to, it is not unreasonable to ask, “[Smallpotatoes], are you acting as a private citizen, or as an agent of your employer?”

Other than the fact that he put you on the defensive, sort of like the proverbial, "when did you stop beating your wife," question, he really didn't. Looks to me like you simply chose to disengage, which was probably a prudent decision. You really can't argue with people who are as clinically deranged as this guy obviously is, and you'll tie yourself in logical knots if you try.

Sometimes I think that about 1/2 of MSNBC's audience is right wing bloggers waiting for a host to say something outrageous for them to blog about.

Similarly, smallpotatoes and others like him must make up a huge percentage of the audience for right wing kooks like this guy. If not for his posts, I would have never heard of him, and I'd have to go re-read his post to even remember his name.